bears instead of a percentage of the takings.
‘Do you have red soles?’ he asked Alison, making his way to his gigantic leather chair that a family of four could live in.
‘Why, did I step in something?’ She stood on one foot and hopped around lightly, trying to keep her balance while checking her soles, appearing to Lou like a dog trying to chase its tail.
‘It doesn’t matter.’ He sat down at his desk wearily.
She viewed him with suspicion before returning her attention to her schedule. ‘At eight thirty you have a phone call with Aonghus O’Sullibháin about needing to become a fluent Irish speaker in order to buy that plot in Connemara. However, I have arranged for your benefit for the conversation to be as Béarla …’ She smirked and threw back her head, like a horse would, pushing her mane of highlighted hair off her face. ‘At eight forty-five you have a meeting with Barry Brennan about the slugs they found on the Cork site –’
‘Cross your fingers they’re not rare,’ he groaned.
‘Well, you never know, sir, they could be relatives of yours. You have some family in Cork, don’t you?’ She still wouldn’t look at him. ‘At nine thirty –’
‘Hold on a minute.’ Despite knowing he was alone with her in the room, Lou looked around hoping for back-up. ‘Why are you calling me sir? What’s gotten into you today?’
She looked away, mumbling what Lou thought sounded like, ‘Not you, that’s for sure.’
‘What did you say?’ But he didn’t wait for an answer. ‘I’ve a busy day, I could do without the sarcasm, thank you. And since when did the day’s schedule become a morning announcement?’
‘I thought that if you heard how packed your day is, aloud, then you might decide to give me the go-ahead to make less appointments in future.’
‘Do you want less work to do, Alison, is that what this is all about?’
‘No,’ she blushed. ‘Not at all. I just thought that you could change your work routine a little. Instead of these manic days spent darting around, you could spend more time with fewer clients. Happier clients.’
‘Yes, then me and Jerry Maguire will live together happily ever after. Alison, you’re new to the company so I’ll let this go by, but this is how I like to do business, okay? I like to be busy, I don’t need two-hour lunchbreaks and schoolwork at the kitchen table with the kids.’ He narrowed his eyes. ‘You mentioned happier clients; have you had any complaints?’
‘Your mother. Your wife,’ she said through gritted teeth. ‘Your brother. Your sister. Your daughter.’
‘My daughter is five years old.’
‘Well, she called when you forgot to pick her up from Irish dancing lessons last Thursday.’
‘That doesn’t count,’ he rolled his eyes, ‘because my five-year-old daughter isn’t going to lose the company hundreds of millions of euro, is she?’ Once again he didn’t wait for a response. ‘Have you received any complaints from people who do not share my surname?’
Alison thought hard. ‘Did your sister change her name back after the separation?’
He glared at her.
‘Well then, no, sir.’
‘What’s with the sir thing?’
‘I just thought,’ her face flushed, ‘that if you’re going to treat me like a stranger, then that’s what I’ll do too.’
‘How am I treating you like a stranger?’
She looked away. ‘Not something He lowered his voice. ‘Alison, we’re at the office, what do you want me to do? Tell you how much I enjoyed screwing your brains out in the middle of discussing our appointments?’
‘You didn’t screw my brains out, we just kissed.’
‘Whatever.’ He waved his hand dismissively. ‘What’s this about?’
She had no answer to that but her cheeks were on fire. ‘Perhaps Alfred mentioned something to me.’
Lou’s heart did an unusual thing then, that he hadn’t experienced before. A fluttering of some sort. ‘What did he mention?’
She looked away, began fidgeting with the corner of the page. ‘Well, he mentioned something about you missing that meeting last week –’
‘Not something, I want specifics here, please.’
She bristled. ‘Okay, em, well, after the meeting last week with Mr O’Sullivan, he – as in Alfred –’ she swallowed, ‘suggested that I try to stay on top of you a bit more. He knew that I was new to the job and his advice to me was not to allow you to miss an important meeting again.’
Lou’s blood boiled and his mind raced. He’d never felt such confusion. Lou spent his life running from one thing to another, missing half of the first in order just to make it to the end of the other. He did this all day every day, always feeling like he was catching up in order to get ahead. It was long and hard and tiring work. He had made huge sacrifices to get where he was. He loved his work, was totally and utterly professional and dedicated to every aspect of it. To be pulled up on missing one meeting that had not yet been scheduled when he had taken the morning off, angered him. It also angered him that it was family that had caused this. If it was another meeting he had sacrificed it for, he would feel better about it, but he felt a sudden anger at his mother. It was her that he had collected from hospital after a hip replacement, the morning of the meeting. He felt angry at his wife for talking him into doing it when his suggestion to arrange a car to collect his mother had sent her into a rage. He felt anger at his sister Marcia and his older brother Quentin for not doing it instead. He was a busy man, and the one time he chose family over work, he had to pay the price. He stood up and paced by the window, biting down hard on his lip and feeling such anger he wanted to pick up the phone and call his entire family and tell them, ‘See? See, this is why I can’t always be there. See? Now look what you’ve done!’
‘Did you not tell him that I had to collect my mother from the hospital?’ He said it quietly because he hated saying it. He hated hearing those words that he despised other colleagues using. Hated the excuses, their personal lives being brought into the office. To him, it was a lack of professionalism. You either did the job, or you didn’t.
‘Well, no, because it was my first week and Mr Patterson was standing with him and I didn’t know what you would like me to say –’
‘Mr Patterson was with him?’ Lou asked, his eyes almost popping out of his head.
She nodded up and down, wide-eyed, like one of those toys with a loose neck.
‘Right.’ His heart began to slow down, now realising what was going on. His dear friend Alfred was up to his tricks. Tricks that Lou had assumed up until now that he was exempt from. Alfred could never get by a day doing things by the book. He looked at things from an awkward angle, came at conversations from an unusual perspective too; always trying to figure out the best way he could come out of any situation.
